EOHR has initiated the first workshop on Monday, 18 November, 2013, to spread the human rights culture among youth and the universities’ students, and that’s to build a conscious generation able to deal with the new political facts of life, aware of all the developments on the political level, and also aware of his rights and fundamental freedoms.

The first part of the workshop has tackled the basic concepts of human rights. Essam Shiha, cassation lawyer and a member of the supreme body of the Wafd Party, has started the workshop by discussing the basic concepts of human rights which constitute an essential part in the studies of human rights, these concepts have became very important recently in the political life especially after the Arab spring revolutions, which called for the achieving of democracy and the respect of human rights.

Shiha has explained these concepts to make the youth accustomed to them, able to deal with them, and be able to understand them while participating in the political life either within political parties or trade unions or other associations, and the most prominent of these concepts are Declaration, Treaty, Convention, Covenant, Charter, Protocol, To sign, To ratify, The reservation, The international law of human rights, and The international humanitarian law.

Shiha has further explained the international council for human rights as it is considered international subsidiary of the General Assembly of the United Nations and it replaced the Commission on Human Rights , which was abolished and concluded its work in 16/6/2006, and established the International Council on Human Rights under the General Assembly resolution to the United Nations on February 24, 2006, and has elected the members of the Board on May 9, 2006 and held its first meeting on 19 June 2006.

Shiha explained the tasks carried by the Council, such as carry out all the duties and responsibilities of the Commission on Human Rights and working on its improving and rationalizing, maintaining a system of special procedures and complaints procedures, promoting and protecting human rights, the advancement of education in the field of human rights as well as advisory services and technical assistance in consultation with Member States, the establishment of dialogue between Member States in all relevant topics in the field of human rights, making recommendations to the General Assembly in order to develop the international law of human rights, conducting a follow-up to the extent of the obligation of States under international covenants on human rights, establishing a dialogue and encourage international cooperation to prevent human rights violations and to respond quickly in emergency cases related to human rights, replacing the Commission on Human Rights with regard to their responsibility towards the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, and organizing the work between governments and national institutions for human rights and civil society organizations, to provide recommendations relating to the promotion and protection of human rights, and to submit an annual report to the General Assembly of the United Nations.

Dina El-Ghamry, has discussed the second topic in the workshop, that is, the intellectual roots of human rights, emphasizing that the philosophical and legal march did not start in the absence of history there that the modern civilization concepts of human rights was built on previous foundations, therefore the historical value of the human rights contents are not less important than the objective value , that historical value highlights the importance of the objective value and addressing the issue of human rights from a historical perspective and try to seek the historical origins of this march was important to draw a picture of the process of change that occurred in the ideas which resulted in the call for a national movement and international human rights organizations to find out the possibility of ensuring the application of these rights in a practical way.

El-Ghamry has added that we cannot state a specific moment for the start of the idea of human rights, but most probably these assets have started with the beginning of creating a joint life for the human beings, therefore these ideas are old as the human life itself even if it were primitive. Also she mentioned that the Pharaonic civilization contributed to the embodiment of legal thought for the protection of human rights that the historians found that the first written pages of the human history were written in the territory of Pharaonic Egypt (about a year 3300 BC), and that’s when the farming villages united along the Nile in the two kingdoms, namely: “the kingdom of Upper Egypt” and “Kingdom of Lower Egypt” under the rule of the Pharaohs and the people was subjected to the law of “MAAT” which had three pillars; the truth, justice, and honesty and this law became from the religious beliefs of the ancient Egyptian people.

From his side, Karim Ali, Researcher at the Faculty of Economics and Political Science, has discussed the third topic, that is, the political participation of the youth whom are the future of this country, leaders of tomorrow, and who have the responsibility of developing the society in all the fields; political, economic, social, and cultural. And their role depends on the training, caring, and developments they are subjected to, to be able to take their decisions in the suitable time.

From his side, Hassan Ali, has emphasized the growing importance of youth participation in public affairs as one of the most important pillars of citizenship and participatory democracy in the contemporary societies. That participating ,especially from the youth, is considered the most important way to mobilize the energies of the younger generations and the renewal of blood in the arteries of the political and social system of the nation and contribute to the continues development movement.

Ali has further added that the political participation is considered as type of the community participation since it includes information, experience, skills, and political attitude. And all the different institutions collaborate to develop this participation, and the family institution comes in the forefront of these institutions since it is the most influential while sharing this feature and responsibility with the schools, universities, and the civil institutions.

Finally Ali concluded his speech by pointing that we need to develop a frame of mind to deal with the political empowerment of young people, build databases for the purpose of the policies of youth empowerment sufficient to measure its outcome on the youth themselves, enable the public opinion research and social surveys in terms of the political, security, legal and regulatory as well as in terms of the investment in their human and technical capacities as independent institutions have pivotal role in deepening “our knowledge about young people.”

This entry was posted on Monday, November 18th, 2013 at 4:06 pm
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